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 Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:03 pm
"So I noticed," Björn nodded, "Yeah, you can come with us. If anyone ******** with you, they have to deal with me first. Come on." He pet Ethan's hair unintentionally, face pitying and fearful. And then he started out.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:07 pm
Marcos picked up the key to Richard's van from the rickety table by the door, casting a last look around before he started looking distinctly green again.
"Tell me where to go, and I'll drive," he said wearily, knuckling impatiently at his remaining eye as it stung abominably. Down the stairs - which, aside from a puddle of blood, was devoid of the traitorous George's remains - and out the door, the long-off wail of police and ambulance sirens drifted, and Marcos gave a shudder.
"Right on schedule..."
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:15 pm
Björn warped an arm around the guy's shoulders, seeing how distraught he was.
"Everything'll be alright," he said after a moment...and in the end, it generally was.
---
Back at the house, Hellis had answered the door, as per usual, and led Björn with Ethan and the new guy to the couch, immediately running out to get a glass of water for the new guy.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:31 pm
Ethan, pale, sweating and shivering, gave a very low moan and curled into a ball. Marcos sat beside him, looking deathly worried.
"Ah, not again," he muttered, taking a stained and worn-out handkerchief from the depths of his jean pocket and mopping Ethan's brow again. "Heya...couldn't spare a blanket, could you?"
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:33 pm
Björn held Ethan to him as Hellis and up to their room and returned with a comforter than he immediately offered to the new guy.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:40 pm
Marcos nodded his thanks, watching as Ethan's head thrashed to one side.
"Easy," he muttered, wiping sweat-dampened hair out of the boy's face. "Easy."
Ethan muttered something fitfully, and went still. Marcos let out a long sigh and plucked at the blanket.
"He never said a word," he said, leaning back and cracking his knuckles absently. "Not once. Nearly two years, not a peep. He'd give a bit of a yelp if ya hit him, but even then that was the most he'd do. Never knew why."
Watching as color slowly returned to Ethan's face, Marcos claimed the blanket for himself and tugged it around his shoulders.
"Piper'd make a game out of it, tryin' to make him talk," he said sourly. "Stupid kid. Wouldn't have gotten belted so many times if he'd just ******** said something."
Getting up, Marcos clutched the blanket around his shoulders and paced the room in anxiety, wincing every now and again and resting a hand over his stomach.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:43 pm
Björn shook his head.
"I'd kill the guy if he wasn't already dead."
Hellis moved to the new guy and grabbed him by the arm, face contorted with worry. He wanted to help.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:51 pm
Marcos flinched at the unexpected touch, though not badly enough to discourage Hellis. He looked over and smiled ruefully.
"Heh. Little Miss Lethe damn well knows how to tie up loose ends," he said with a rather nasty grin, thinking about the mess that had been splattered in that old basement cell. "I oughta buy her something pretty."
A long silence fell, punctuated only by Ethan's occasional coughs. After an hour, the boy woke with a start. Not expecting to be held and terrified of what was holding him, he thrashed wildly.
"Nečiniť!"
Marcos winced.
"Ethan, easy!"
Ethan stopped thrashing, taking deep gulps of air. He blinked up dumbly at Björn, too disoriented to do much of anything.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 5:56 pm
"Shhhh," Björn said, stroking Ethan's cheek with a thumb, "You're fine now."
Hellis was sitting in a chair, silently thinking over the new guy's bizarre pains.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 6:03 pm
Ethan gave a wild laugh that was half a sob, pressing a hand to his cheek and drawing it away, looking for blood.
"Wasn't fast enough," he said wildly. "I couldn't...he was..."
Unable to string the English together, he lapsed into rapidfire Slovak, sitting up and pressing a fist to his temple, the rosary's crucifix clutched in his hand. He had started to shiver again.
"Ethan, we don't know what you're saying, slow down," Marcos said, bewildered. After all, he wasn't used to the kid talking period. Now he was talking faster than Marcos could hear. Ethan took a deep breath, then another, willing himself to calm down.
"I'm sorry," he said finally. Marcos nodded.
"S'okay."
After a few moments silence, letting the kid regroup, Marcos sat down on the couch and eyed Ethan warily.
"You recognized those things, didn't you?"
Ethan froze, then nodded. Slowly. Reluctantly.
"Can you...Ethan, what were they?"
"Skinners," he said in a low, coarse voice, looking sick. Marcos blinked dumbly.
"What?"
"SKINNERS!" Ethan screamed. He gave another terrible shudder and turned his head away, clinging to Björn.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 6:05 pm
"Shhhhh, it's okay," Björn repeated, kissing Ethan on the top of the head and mouthing 'not now' to the new guy. Too soon, too soon.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 6:21 pm
Marcos looked shamed, and withdrew.
"Sorry," he said hesitantly, knuckling awkwardly at his blinded eye in his usual nervous tic.
"It's not," Ethan said with a hysterical laugh. "It's not okay, it's not it's not. They'll find me, he'll get me, he'll do it again, all of it all over again not okay-"
Ethan tried to stem the raving but he couldn't. He shuddered, laughing and crying, clutching the crucifix so hard he could feel the edges cutting into his palm.
"When I first woke up here," he muttered finally, the hysteria subsiding. "I saw a man with a flayed face standing outside the door of my cell. He was just looking at me. The next time I saw him, he just opened the door and picked me up and cut me. All over."
Marcos looked over at him, eyebrows raised.
"Why?"
Ethan smiled bitterly.
"Because he wanted to make me speak."
And with that, Ethan buried his head in the crook of Björn's arm and said nothing further.
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 6:26 pm
Björn found himself in near-tears and simply held Ethan as best he could, trying to calm him in whatever way he could.
"I'm not gonna let you outta my sight. I'm not gonna let them get to you. I'll stay up all month if I have to."
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Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 6:51 pm
__Part 9
Marcos had been planning on getting well and truly drunk, but he ran into Julian instead.
"AUGH!"
Julian, worn out from a long day of surgery and the arrival of two more mutilated murder victims, gave Marcos the barest of glances.
"G'morning," he said vaguely, stumbling into the house and picking up his bag, which he'd left by mistake that morning.
"You're the one- t-the one who- you set fire to-" Marcos spluttered.
"Venison," Julian muttered, barely able to keep his eyes open as he stumbled out of the house.
"...venison?" Marcos echoed, watching Julian disappear. "The hell?"
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Posted: Fri Sep 21, 2007 11:47 am
__Part 10
It was by unlucky coincidence that the apartment remained abandoned for the next few days. Julian, harried, sleep-deprived and liable to snap at anything that spoke to him, had taken to staying either at the hospital or a friend's house near the hospital, in case his damnable beeper summoned him to surgery yet again. Crow was away on business, and Lenore....well, she was doing her own thing.
Ethan had elected to stay at the Devreaux house. Marcos had followed suit.
"What's the matter with you?" Ethan asked the man, watching as Marcos downed a beer liberally mixed with gin.
"I dunno," Marcos said, looking gaunt and rather pale. "I think I ran into a murderer this morning."
"Another one?"
"Mmhmm."
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